Sunday, February 18, 2007

Thursday I was washing out the french press (aka bodum) and the screw fell out of the screen/filter assembly and went down the drain. And it's not really a normal screw (more like an inverse screw or nut that screws in), so replacing it is going to be difficult. None the less, I did make coffee by pushing the screen down with a fork (this resulted in slightly crunchy coffee, but a drug addict is willing to put up with a few imperfections). And just to totally gross people out, I drank the microwave-reheated leftovers on Friday. But clearly this was a temporary solution.

Saturday I was at Canadian Tire (buying someone a new car battery as I had to move their car for snow plowing and it wouldn't even turn over and I don't desire to be jump starting their car all winter long) and decided to pick up a stove-top espresso maker (Moka style) for $20 (of course I had to buy new plates, windshield wipers and a shovel as well - I'm quite an impulsive consumer). I've had a camping espresso maker for years that works great, so... Does anyone have any idea how to get this stupid thing to work well? My camping one works perfect every time. I've used it a few times now with varying degrees of success. Here's my problem and questions:

Problem: The water boils, but only about 1/4 of the water actually makes it to the top chamber, the rest stays down below eventually boiling off as steam if left long enough. I'm pretty sure its supposed to boil fast and violently passing up to the upper chamber in 30 seconds or so of boiling.

Questions: I've ground the coffee quite fine and packed it quite full and firmly (following others instructions and a quick search online. I've also put the water right up to the pressure valve. I tried it a 2nd time (with the same grounds) but after removing a scoop of grounds and it seem to work better. Perhaps I just have too much and too fine off coffee and its not letting the water boil up enough?

So anyway, today's espresso only created about 2 ounces of elixir, but the consistency was very thick and the results have been equivalent to drinking a pot of coffee (after adding milk and additional water to make a full coffee cup). Zinger! If this were beer, it would put Guinness to shame.

Thursday, February 15, 2007

Ever listen to radio3? I'm listening to some streaming new age hip hop rap electronic shit right now (No Luck Club from Burnaby) on radio3.cbc.ca. Actually now it's the New Pornographers (The Bleeding Heart Show). The basic streaming music website focusing on Canadian indie/alternative music, but with neat multimedia stuff. You can click on what's playing and get band info and other songs and stuff. I haven't been to the site since they re-did the website, though I've been listening to the radio3 podcasts via iTunes. Anyway, I checked the site out again because I saw it won an award in the US for best online multimedia programming or something (despite being Canadian... but I guess since it's online it goes cross border).

I'd recommend the blog and the blog archives for some neat links too...

P.S. Me edited this heres post cause my mom saids there was an grammer error - thanks to me mom for catchen that there error here cause I think me fixed it and me wan'ts not to sound iliterate.